[Strange Visitor]

Law of identity 1/27/2005 1:29 AM
Well my name is sohaib thats wht i heard from my friends dad mom or any other man i interact but i hav a nick im also known as "strange visitor" so now i hav two identities. Similarly,theres a chair for you but in our language its kursy. So things can hav many artificial identities.

This is wat i had something figured out. wat would be the real identity of anything. No one could gues. wat would be the real identity of anything it is only known by thing which or who created us. Consider this "i can be called as you" this mean at the same instant i am you and you as i.

The law of identity is that life made by humans are full of false identities the real identity is hidden not known by you or me. this world is mysterious as the life on it.

[sanctus]

Welcome!

This question you pose has already been posed by platon (the ancient greek philosopher) in the text entitled somthing like "the cave myth" (it's my translation from italian to english). How I understand his argumentation is that the real thing we know it, but can't feine it. Example: I say "horse" and you (and I) imagine something, maybe it's a black horse maybe a red one but that doesn't matter we both know what we speak about. It's simply that we have the concept in our brain, if we see a horse on a picture or reality we always know what a horse is.

Hope I was clear, if not ask...

[Buffy]

Boy there sure are a lot of concepts flying in these few sentances....Lots of literary and philisophical references could be brought to bear here:

"A Rose by any other name would smell as sweet" -- Shakespeare

So if "identity" = "word used" that one's the best commentary I can give.

On the lighter side there's also George Carlin's old joke:

Clerk: "What's your name"
Janofsky: "Janofsky"
Clerk: "How do you spell that?"
Janofsky: "S-M-I-T-H.....They're all silent, nevermind."

On the otherhand the semanticists would work on the issue of "identity"="abstact concept" which gets at the issue of "when I say horse, I see a white one and you see a red one, but we both agree on what we're talking about". In addition to Plato (and try Socrates too for ancient philosophy on the subject), you might want to try Gottlob Frege's "Sense and Reference (or Denotation)" which is linked from this very good summation of the topic in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sense_and_reference.

In the sense of "identity"="interpretation of reality" of course I'd push you to the Existentialists, recommending in my own biased view, Sarte ("No Exit") and Beckett ("Waiting for Godot"), but you probably should wade through Wittgenstein or Nitzche if you can hack it. For something lighter on this topic, just go see "The Matrix" trilogy on DVD.

In the sense of "identity" = "who am I?", well, I guess I'm a good example, and the exitentialists sure get into it too, but heck, just go rent "The Prisoner" series on DVD:

"Who are you?"
"The new Number Two."
"Who is Number One?"
"You are Number Six."
"I am not a number, I am a free man!"
"Muhuhahahahaha!"

Even we ourselves don't know who we are, although I generally dislike seeing the word "Law" in any sentance dealing with metaphysics....

Cheers,
Buffy

[sanctus]

Yes it's quite funny your answer buffy made think again about something I didn't since quite a while (as if the fact that I already thought about it changes something, I still don't know), we use the word and idea of the "I" through our daily life (e.g I went shopping, I think, I did), but we aren't able to define it.

Ok, this was a useless post to the discussion, but I thought it interedting...

[OpenMind5]

Everything has an identity and a purpose, the identity is what you give it, and the purpose is what you want it to be. There could be a million "names" or "identities" for a single object, but the purpose is the same, if you have the same intentions.

You can quote me on that one...LOL

OP5

[pgrmdave]

What do we wish to define as an identity? Is it a name of something, an individual facet of something, an idea of something, or that thing itself? I use the word identity, in the sense the question was posed, to mean the object itself, in which case there could be only one. No matter what my name - Dave, David, pgrmdave, pettrum42 - I am still the same object.

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by pgrmdave

I use the word identity, in the sense the question was posed, to mean the object itself, in which case there could be only one. No matter what my name - Dave, David, pgrmdave, pettrum42 - I am still the same object.

Ah, but how are you perceived by others? Saint? Sinner? Source of nutrients (mosquito)? Quiescent host (bacteria)? Mechanism for reproduction (that nasty selfish DNA)?

Cheers,
Buffy

[pgrmdave]

But I never change, I am all those things, but I am me, and any description of me will limit my existance, just as any description of a rock will limit it's existance - there will be more properties than can be described, which is why I don't attribute much meaning to a name.

[Buffy]

Sure, we'd all like to be perceived as the totality of what makes us up. Unfortunately, to your last girlfriend you'll always be "that idiot" and to the mosquito you'll always be "a little high on the hemoglobin count, but still quite tasty." Perception counts more that reality (or equvalently, Einstein was right). Sucky, huh?

Cheers,
Buffy

[pgrmdave]

But the question is what is identity, and to that I say there is an absolute.